Week 648: Caller IDiot


[to Kitchen Aid food processor customer service rep]

"I have a complaint about your product. It processes food. But aren't
processed foods supposed to be bad for you?"

Not content with a half-page of puerility on Page 2 of the Style section
each Sunday, many Invitational readers also wallow in the font of
juvenilia known as Below the Beltway, Gene Weingarten's weekly column in
The Washington Post Magazine. Every few weeks, when he's run out of
anything to say, Gene calls some 1-800 consumer advice numbers advertised
on product packages and harasses the poor PR workers with stupid
questions. As you can see by the example above, Gene is getting pretty
desperate here. Fortunately, he is reputed to be familiar with The Style
Invitational, so you can help him out: Name a product or company and
supply a stupid question to ask the consumer hotline person.

Winner receives the Inker, the official Style Invitational trophy. First
runner-up wins a tapestry wall hanging, contributed by Loser Eric Murphy
of Ann Arbor, Mich., depicting a pretty angel holding a candle and
feeding (or possibly swatting at) some doves. What gives this fine
artwork its Loserly dimension are the slots around the candle, the
angel's halo and her swat-hand, into which you insert little Christmas
lights (included!).

Other runners-up win a coveted Style Invitational Loser T-shirt.
Honorable mentions get one of the lusted-after Style Invitational
Magnets. One prize per entrant per week. Send your entries by e-mail
tolosers@washpost.comor by fax to 202-334-4312. Deadline is Monday, Feb.
13. Include "Week 648" in the subject line of your e-mail, or it risks
being ignored as spam. Include your name, postal address and phone number
with your entry. Contests are judged on humor and originality. All
entries become the property of The Washington Post. Entries may be edited
for taste or content. Results will be published March 5. No purchase
required for entry. Employees of The Washington Post, and their immediate
relatives, are not eligible for prizes. Pseudonymous entries will be
disqualified. The revised title for next week's contest is by Kevin
Dopart of Washington. This week's contest was suggested by Russell Beland
of Springfield, whose name has been printed more than 950 times in The
Washington Post, as opposed to Weingarten's 506 or so.

Report From Week 644, in which we asked for some new events, product tie-ins, etc., to create
some interest in the Winter Olympics, which you probably won't be
watching starting this Friday.

This week was one of those frustrating ones in which a lot of people offered pretty much the same ideas. If the
one you sent is practically identical to one included below, you may file
an appeal to the Empress; be sure to mail your petition inside a suitcase
well lined with that special green Olympic packing material.

4 Punitive Luge: Each country binds one convicted murderer to a sled, has
four men push him. The criminal who reaches the bottom fastest wins glory
for his country. (Seth Brown, North Adams, Mass.)

3 All figure skaters have to perform their routines in those big Seven
Dwarfs costumes. Because let's face it, in terms of future job prospects
. . . (Brendan Beary, Great Mills)

2 The winner of the bobblehead of Arnold Schwarzenegger in a dress: The
Olympic caldron will be positioned below the ski jump. Look for height
and distance records to be shattered this year. (Dave Prevar, Annapolis)
And the Winner of the Inker

1 Carnival biathlon: Each competitor starts with a handful of tokens,
wagering at each shooting station for a chance for larger stuffed
animals, which must be carried for the remainder of the course. Winner
takes the gold medal and the big stuffed giraffe. (Joel Knanishu, Rock
Island, Ill.)

Honorable Mentions

New rules:

To ensure security, the following will be banned or eliminated from
Olympic venues: sharpened blades and poles, white powdery substances,
airborne crystallized material, speeding vehicles and high-altitude
staging areas. (Michael Gips, Bethesda)

To improve their credibility and accuracy, all figure-skating judges must
score each contestant using the Magic 8 Ball. (Rick Haynes, Potomac)

The figure skaters must wear full pads and helmets, while the hockey
players wear the frilly shirts and tight little pants. (Kevin Dopart,
Washington; Brendan Beary).

New events:

Downhill limbo: Just like normal downhill skiing, but there's a
4-foot-high bar across the finish line. In the second round, the bar gets
a little heavier, and a little lower. . . (Brendan Beary)

Die-athlon: Two skiers follow parallel paths and stop to shoot at each
other. No silver or bronze medals will be awarded. (Douglas Frank,
Crosby, Tex.)

Old biathlon: Skiing and shooting. New biathlon: Skiing and doing shots.
(Bode Miller, La Dolce Vita, Italy) (Brendan Beary)

The Athlon: All the excitement of the biathlon at half the cost. (Marc
Naimark, Paris)

Ice Brawling: Hockey with all the boring parts removed. (Seth Brown)

Mouth-to-Mouth Speed-Skating Relay: Stick the metal baton to your tongue
and go. The "handoffs" will be ethpethially exthiting. (Kevin Dopart)

Extreme curling: This already exciting sport is taken to the nail-biting
limit when the ice in the path of the slowly sliding rock is cleared by
high-tech vacuum cleaners. (Kyle Hendrickson, Frederick)

Blobsledding: The 275-pound weight class. (Douglas Frank; Bill Davis,
Canton, Ga.)

Global Warming Biathlon: Contestants start out skating, end up swimming.
(Art Grinath, Takoma Park)

Snow Calligraphy, sponsored by Bud Light: Contestants drink a pitcher of
beer and spell their names. And since it's an international competition,
names must appear in both Roman and Cyrillic alphabets, plus Japanese
kanji. (Brendan Beary)

Protest filing: A competition among coaches. Points awarded for Speed of
Objection, Clarity of Protest and Degree of Hissy Fit. (Stephen Litterst,
Ithaca, N.Y.)

Slush funding: In a demonstration sport, Alaska's congressional
delegation competes to see who can throw the most money at tiny,
ice-bound villages. (Peter Metrinko, Chantilly)

Suburban pentathlon: The 50-meter driveway shovel, the windshield scrape,
finding lost keys in deep snow, the car dig-out and the 100-meter ice
walk in dress shoes. (Martin Bancroft, Rochester, N.Y.; Andrew Hoenig,
Rockville)

Men's Piste-Off: Points awarded for size of the hole created in the snow,
depth of the hole; and style points for an attractive color pattern
around the edge. (Harvey Levy, Kibbutz Kalila, Israel)

Ski-binding: Well-conditioned athletes in Lycra are bound with leather
straps and then must struggle to free themselves. No actual competition
involved, but traditionally one of the most watched events, especially
the pairs category. (Peter Metrinko)

Ads and sponsors:

Team U.S. Curling Association: "Hey, ladies, come see a man with a broom
in his hand!" (Andrew Hoenig)

The U.S. Figure Skating Team, sponsored by Botox: "It takes more than ice
to freeze a smile." (Kevin Dopart)

The U.S. Luge Team: The two-man luge: It's rugged. It's intimate. And
their pants couldn't be any tighter. Don't miss those wild rides down
Brokeback Mountain! (Jay Shuck, Minneapolis)

The biathlon, brought to you by Fox News Network with host Bill O'Reilly:
Fair and Balanced In-Your-Face Coverage of American-Bred, Rifle-Toting
Marksmen Whipping the Elastic Girly Pants off Bands of Incestuous
European U.N. Suckup Cowards. (Robin Grove, Woodbridge)

Opening Ceremonies: Hillary Clinton carries the U.S. flag, having been
dubbed our official Ice Maiden. Finalists follow, including Martha
Stewart, Omarosa and Nancy Grace. (Jean Sorensen, Herndon)

Opening Ceremony: Arrival of the Olympic Snowball, which started out from
Athens as a 50,000-pound block of ice. (Martin Bancroft)

Closing Ceremonies: All the athletes gather around the Olympic caldron
and blow it out on the count of three. (Dave Prevar)

Next Week: A Hearty Har-Har, or Love's Labored Losers